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TRIBUTES 



TO THE MEMORY 



OP 

EBENEZER ROCKWOOD HOAR, 



BY 



€1)0 JHassadjusetts l^istatical ^ocietp. 



February 14, 1895. 



BOSTON: 

PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY. 

1895. 



,' / / /' ■'• 



^anibcrsttg Press: 
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 



I 
I 

ON. 



S^ 



CONTENTS. 



Remarks by page 

Charles Francis Adams 5 

AValbridge a. Field If) 

Letter of 

Jacob D. Cox 27 

Remarks by 

Henry Lee 29 

Edward L. Pierce 34 



£lpa^jsac]^uisettj2{ l^iistorical ^ociett^ 



FEBRUARY MEETING, 1895. 

The stated meeting was held on Thursday, the 14th instant, 
at three o'clock, p. M. ; the first Vice-President, Charles 
Francis Adams, in the chair. 

The record of the January meeting was read and approved ; 
and the Librarian read the list of donors to the Library dur- 
ing the last month. 

Mr. Adams then said : — 

Nearly all those now present will remember that at the last 
meeting of the Society a communication was received from 
one of our most eminent and most valued associates, written 
from what we knew to be his death-bed and intrusting to the 
keeping of the Society a relic of unusual historical interest, — 
a lock of the hair of Abraham Lincoln. To me, at least, there 
was something oppressive in that occasion, — we seemed to 
turn from the graves of Mr. Winthrop and Dr. Ellis only to 
utter a last farewell to Judge Hoar ; and now he also lies 
buried at Concord, with Hawthorne and Emerson. 

It was on the 10th of January that we sent him, in response 
to his letter and gift, a last greeting, and then he was supposed 
to be dying ; but he lingered on — the candle flickering in the 
socket — for exactly three weeks longer, until the evening 
of Thursday the 31st of January, when the last spark of life 
smouldered away. A bright light was gone out. 

Born on the 21st of February, 1816, at the time when both 
in Europe and America the world was just entering on its 
nineteenth-century existence, — for it was then only eight 
months after the battle of Waterloo, only thirteen months 
after the signature of tlie treaty of Ghent, — born thus in 
1816, Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar lacked at his death three 
weeks only of rounding out his seventy-ninth year : nearly 



b TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

seven years younger than Mr. Winthrop and Dr. Holmes, Dr. 
Ellis was his senior by thirty months. He was chosen a mem- 
ber of the Society at the meeting of May 12, 1864, — a date 
the mention of which carries some of us back into what now 
seems another existence ; for, as I well remember, it was on 
that same day that Barlow, at Spottsylvania Court-House, 
made his assault on the salient in Lee's line. While those 
scenes were being enacted in Virginia, the members of the 
Society, meeting here with anxious minds, — thinking rather 
of what was taking place at the scene of war than in this 
room, — went through the customary forms, Mr. Winthrop 
occupying the chair. Thus, thirty-one years ago, lacking 
three months. Judge Hoar's name first appeared at the foot of 
our roll : at the time of his death it stood tenth upon it, in 
seniority ; in eminence, first. 

As presiding officer of the Society, it would in an}' event 
to-day have devolved on me to pay official tribute ; but, had 
this not been so, I should have claimed the privilege. I could 
not have let the occasion pass in silence. We all know how 
seldom it is that the death of any person not of our immediate 
family causes an appreciable sense of difference in our lives. 
There is a sudden shock; and as our thoughts revert to well- 
remembered scenes, and the familiar face and form, it seems 
for the moment as if a great loss had been sustained : but it is 
only for a moment ; and then life moves on as before, the sun 
rises and sets just the same, our pleasures and anxieties are as 
they were, the routine of life is not varied, no empty chair 
confronts us, and it soon requires almost an effort of imagina- 
tion to call up again the half-forgotten presence. 

" Various the roads of life ; in one 
All terminate, one lonely way. 
We go ; and ' Is he gone ? ' 
Is all our best friends say." 

The average man can probably number on the fingers of his 
two hands those he has ever known or, outside of his family 
circle, been associated with, whose departure to join the silent 
majority had caused him a lasting sense of personal loss, — 
those of whose going he could truly say that thereafter some- 
thing was missing, a light had gone out, a voice was silent, 
a familiar presence ought to be there and was not. 

Yet it is so to me personally with Judge Hoar. An indi- 
viduality is gone ; the world is not, will not again be, quite 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. I 

what it was, — something has passed from it. And yet I 
never, or never until quite recently, knew Judge Hoar well. 
Some twenty months ago, — driven from a home of two hun- 
dred and fifty years by the steady, irresistible advance of what 
the world is pleased to call modern improvements, including 
telegraph poles, asphalt sidewalks, brick blocks, and electric 
railways, — driven, I say, from an ancestral abiding-place by 
the encroachments of these unpleasing features of city life, 
I moved from Quincy to Lincoln ; and as Lincoln adjoins 
Concord, I there found myself a near neighbor of Judge 
Hoar's. For nearly forty years I had known him more or 
less, — hereditary, family friends; I had met him in these 
rooms, more frequently still at the dinners of the Saturday 
Club, and now and again public events or discussion would 
throw us together; but only of late did we come together in 
Concord and as neighbors. It was, as I have said, less than 
two years ago, and I can but add that Lincoln and Concord, 
now that he is dead, are no longer quite the same to me, — a 
something is gone from them, and I shall miss it all the time. 

Thus, what I now have to say of Judge Hoar has a personal 
significance ; it is no mere official and perfunctory utterance. 
I feel I am speaking of a friend, who was — and is not. 
And, in the first place, I want to bear my witness to the man. 
In speaking of Mr. Winthrop here now only two meetings 
since, I used the expression, which to me means much, that, 
after all, in weighing in the balance those we have known, 
we get to realize that in this life it is not so much what a man 
does as what he is. He may succeed in a worldly way or 
in a worldly way he may fail, — he may win or lose the 
game, — but he still will be a man, or not a man, for all that; 
and for what he is, or was, and not for his skill at the game, 
at last we take him. Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar was every 
inch a man. 

Springing, as I shall presently have occasion to point out, 
from the oldest and purest English New England stock, 
Judge Hoar was in body, thought, word, and action a typi- 
cal New Englander. Shrewd in thought, keen of speech, 
angular and even rough in aspect and demeanor, whenever 
and however it was struck, the material of which he was 
made returned a true ring. 

He was essentially a Puritan. But just as there are men 
and men, so there are Puritans and Puritans ; and Rockwood 



8 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

Hoar was a Puritan of the most attractive kind. Yet it was 
curious in observing him to note how easily a slight differ- 
ence in his composition — in the balance, so to speak, of 
his make-up — would have wholly changed the result, bring- 
ing to the front the more repellent as well as familiar 
attributes of those of whom he was a type, A man of in- 
tense, deep-rooted convictions, — religious, political, social ; 
of strong family and local, almost clan, feelings ; seeing 
things most clearly from his own point of view, and not devoid 
of prejudices ; conscious of strength, and consequently fearless 
of contact with opponents ; honest himself and intuitively sen- 
sitive to dishonesty in others, with an instinct like the scent 
of a hunting-dog for cant, pretence and sham, and a wit 
which as with flashes of lightning revealed and not infre- 
quently scathed what he thus instinctively saw, — Judge Hoar 
was saved from that Puritan sourness of disposition so often 
noticed, by a sense of humor and a spirit of kindliness which 
were worthy of Shakespeare or Montaigne. They redeemed 
him altogether. 

Like Mr. Winthrop, I think Judge Hoar must have grown 
kindlier as he grew older. And yet he too had had his checks 
and reverses ; to him, as to Mr. Winthrop, of life-long import 
also. That in 1868 another was preferred over his head, and 
he was not made Chief Justice of that Supreme Court of Massa- 
chusetts of which he was then the senior judge, was, as I think 
all will now agree, a slight upon him as cruel as it was un- 
merited. Looking back through thirty years, he would, in my 
judgment, have been justified in resenting it. I am glad that 
his friends did resent it. So again, when, two years later, 
President Grant nominated him as a Justice of the Supreme 
Court of the United States and the Senate rejected him, — 
it was the Senate, not he, that stands condemned of record. 
One winter afternoon, years ago, I remember, we got jesting 
with him over the table of the Saturday Club upon his sup- 
posed roughness of manner and sharpness of tongue, while 
he himself entered into the spirit of our badinage most keenly 
of all ; and then, without the slightest indication of feeling or 
irritation, but with strong humor, he repeated the remark of 
Senator Cameron of Pennsylvania, a personal friend of his, ex- 
planatory of that Senate rejection, — " What could you expect 
for a man who had snubbed seventy Senators!" — seventy 
then being the full chamber. That way of putting it un- 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 9 

doubtedl}' had a basis, and no little basis, of truth. Judge 
Hoar at the time, — and, be it also remembered, it was the 
time of the so-called reconstruction of the subdued South, — 
Judge Hoar was tlien, I say, head of the Department of Jus- 
tice. As such he had a large patronage to distribute, and was 
brought in close contact with many eager applicants and 
their senatorial patrons. His sense of humor on such occa- 
sions did not always have time to come to his rescue, and it 
was commonly alleged of him that, in political parlance, " he 
could not see things " ; the real fact being that with his rugged 
honest}" and keen eye for pretence and jobbery he saw things 
only too clearly. And so, fiist and last, he '' snubbed seventy 
Senators," — all the Senators there were ; and they, after 
their kind, in due time " got even with him," as some among 
them doubtless expressed it. 

Then it was, under this undeserved stigma, twice repeated, 
— first in the State House at Boston, next in the Capitol 
at Washington, — then it was that the metal of the man's 
nature returned its true ring. He wore defeat as 't were a 
laurel crown. I knew him well, — I am vain enough to say 
that in these latter and better days I knew him almost inti- 
mately, — and never by look or word did I see in him indica- 
tion of malice, unkindness, or harshness of memory. Two 
men, and two men only, among his leading cotemporaries 
with whom he had been brought in sharp personal collision, 
have I heard him criticise, and criticise witli that incisiveness 
of thought reflected in speech of which he was the consum- 
mate master; but in the case of those two his words were 
colored by contempt for what he felt was rancor and mean- 
ness rather than by any sense of injury received. 

But, turning from this aspect of the man, I would say a few 
words of him as we saw him here. Though a constant attend- 
ant at our meetings, — sitting always in the place towards 
which we sliall hereafter not rarely turn, flunking instinctively 
there to see him again, — a close listener and keen observer, 
like Cassius, looking " quite through the deeds of men," Judge 
Hoar took little active part in our proceedings. Rarely did 
he join in our discussions ; still more rarely did he contribute 
to our record. In fact, I do not think Judge Hoar's taste 
turned to literar}^ effort. With a singular felicity of language 
and power of expression, — coining a phrase now and again 



10 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP 

as no one but himself could coin it, — sustained effort with the 
pen seemed irksome to liim. His opinions as a judge were 
always tersel}^ put, nor was he at all given to elaborate speeches, 
much less rhetorical tours de force. And yet, alone among the 
prominent members of the bar that I have known. Judge Hoar 
and Richard H. Dana — those two — had a distinctly literary 
element in their composition. In the case of each it was 
there ; and, what was more, literary men instinctively recog- 
nized that it was there. This was most apparent at the Satur- 
day Club. The angle of contact in the two was different, and 
well worthy of notice. They were both remarkable men, — 
among the most so that it has been my good fortune to meet, 
— they would have distinguished themselves anywhere or at 
any time. Shakespeare, Moliere, Edmund Burke, Samuel 
Johnson, Walter Scott, or Goethe would have delighted in 
their company ; and blind Milton's countenance would have 
lighted up, if upon a Sunday afternoon he could have looked 
forward to an hour's call from his friend, and brother Puritan, 
Rockwood Hoar. But while Dana found his point of contact 
with the literary man in his wealth of imagination and his con- 
versational power, that of Hoar lay in his shrewd common- 
sense perception, his keen wit, and his genuine, homely sense 
of humor. So Emerson loved him ; Hawthorne studied him ; 
Lowell paid tribute to him ; George William Curtis quoted 
him. All of them profoundly respected him. He walked with 
them in their peculiar province as their equal. And now he 
has left us and again joined them. It was, and is, a choice 
companionship. 

Yet one word. I feel that I am of late taking up more than 
my share of your time in referring to those of us who ai'e 
gone ; but in the present case I have a dying injunction to obey, 
almost a duty to perform. I have referred to Judge Hoar's ances- 
try, to that honest pride of descent which was so strongly, 
so characteristically an element of his rugged individuality. I 
have also said that as a neighbor my relations with him had of 
late assumed the shape almost of intimacy. We were far- 
away cousins, so far away that I shall not endeavor to trace 
or state the degree ; but I belonged to the clan, and with him 
blood was indeed thicker than water. As he grew more and 
more infirm, but never less cheerful and ever more kindly, it 
was my custom from time to time, as my afternoon rides car- 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 11 

ried me by his door, to stop, and, if I could not see him, at 
least to inquire for him. When I was so fortunate as to find 
him, his face, naturally harsh in outline and now ashen with 
age and increasing infirmity, would light up and become 
instinct with expression and kindliness, so that it seemed to 
me as if no one I had ever met had so charming and ingratiat- 
ing a manner. That he should ever have been regarded as 
rough and repellent was not to be imagined ! But, of late, I 
did not often see him. He was confined to his room. The 
last of these occasions was on Sunday the 30th of Decemljer, 
the month before his death. He was then a stricken, con- 
sciously dying man. Hearing my voice below, — at any rate, 
knowing I was there, — he presently sent for me to come to his 
chamber, and I saw him for what both he and I knew to be the 
last time. For me at least there was something infinitely touch- 
ing in the interview, — I was conscious that it froze me up. I 
could not even attempt to express by act, much less by word, 
what I felt. The contrast was too great. Fresh from the sad- 
dle and swift motion in the strong winter air, I sat by his side 
in the death-laden twilight atmosphere of the sick-room ; but 
though he labored for breath, his voice was strong and his 
cheerfulness and humor unabated. Taking my hand, still 
cold from the frosty air, he began at once by humorously 
charging me with having proceeded to administer on his estate 
in anticipation of his death, in an allusion I had made, in some 
published remarks of mine, at a dinner given the evening 
before to our associate Mr. Pierce, the biographer of Sumner ; ^ 

1 The following is the allusion referred to. It has a certain historical inter- 
est of its own as well as a connection with Judge Hoar, so that it is here quoted 
in full from the published record of the Pierce-Sumner dinner : — 

"One more incident, — an incident which brings upon the stage my friend 
Mr. Pierce, as well as other memorable characters. The scene shifts to England ; 
and the time last summer onlj-. I was in the cathedral of Peterborough, when 
I saw Mr. Pierce's name written in the visitors' book directly above my own. I 
went through the noble edifice until I found him, and we walked together up and 
down the grand Norman nave and transept. He spoke of his book and of Sum- 
ner, and tlien suddenly said, ' By the wa}', a curious thing ; I wonder if you can 
throw light upon it. When your grandfather died, in 1848, your father sent to 
Mr. Sumner " a slight token," as he described it, as a remembrance of your grand- 
father, not saying what it was. I found his note among Mr. Sumner's papers, but. 
have never succeeded in getting any trace of the article. You wrote me some 
years ago that it was a silver ring, which, to correct the tremulousness of his 
hand, your grandfather wore to stead}' his pen in writing. Have you any idea 
what became of that ring after Sumner's death ? ' ' Yes,' I replied at once, ' I 



12- TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP 

and then, in reply to my inquiries, he began to discourse on 
the necessity, as he expressed it, of a new humane society. 
We have, said he, all sorts of societies for the prevention of 
cruelty to children and to animals ; " but what we most need 
now," he added, " as it seems to me, is a society to promote 
ease of dying in old people." I had been cautioned not to 
remain with him long, as his strength was unequal to conver- 
sation ; so presently I rose to leave, and we joined hands for the 
last time. To me at least such occasions are terrible. You 
long to say that which words may not express, and the utter 
inability to do so causes an appearance of reserve against 
which one strives in vain. You feel — you are — powerless. 
It was so with me then ; but just as I had left the room, sad- 
dened, self-abashed, and even humiliated, I heard his voice 



can tell yoii exactly what became of it. In the first place it was not a ring at all. 
I was mistaken. I knew that my father at that time sent such a ring to Dr. 
Palfrey ; and my strong impression was that he had sent a companion ring to 
Mr. Sumner. I so wrote to you. But since then Judge E. R. Hoar lias inci- 
dentally told me that, when Sumner died, his sister sent to him (Judge Hoar) 
two silver sleeve-buttons which my grandfather was wearing at the time of his 
death in the Capitol at Washington, and which my father had then sent to her 
brother.' That was tlie ' slight token ' ; and was it not singular that our friend, 
Mr. Pierce, after seeking high and low for a solution of that little American 
biosrapliical puzzle, dating back more than twenty years, should suddenly find 
it as he paced up and down in the dim light of the ancient cathedral of 
Peterborougli ! 

"A few days afterwards we both returned to America, and I shortly, being 
now a near neighbor of his, called on my old friend, Judge Hoar. He is not 
here to-night. Of all living men he should be liere ; but the end cometh, and 
the places which knew him will soon know him no more forever. But, as I was 
saying, soon after my return I called to see him at his home ; nor shall I soon 
forget the look of genuine pleasure which liglited up that rugged, familiar face, 
and the exclamation, ' Why ! Charley boy ! ' wliich broke out, as he welcomed 
me back. Rarely liave look and invohmtary exclamation given me keener and 
more lasting pleasure, — from that source it was a compliment, than wliich none 
greater. 

"Then, as we sat on his porcli, looking out on the quiet tree-shaded Concord 
road, and chatted in the pleasant October afternoon, I mentioned among other 
things the incident of tlie 'little token' and Peterborough cathedral, and how 
singular it was that our friend liere should at last have found trace of it when 
and as he did. Judge Hoar agreed; and then, referring to those sleeve-buttons, 
he suddenly turned and said, ' Do you know, I 've been thinking I ought to 
leave those to you!' I do not know or greatly care whether he really does it; 
but I do know how gratified I felt when he said it. That ' little token ' has a 
genealogy; it is a verital)le transmitte.ndum, — John Quincy Adams in 1848, 
Charles Sumner in 1874, Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar in 1895: it is a goodly parent- 
age ! If the ' little token ' should now, indeed, pass on to me, I shall be but a 
trustee. Wlio next ? " 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 13 

calling me to come back. I did so, and, looking up at me, he 
said, "Take care of Joanna Hoar." They were the last words 
he ever spoke to me. 

I obey the injunction. 

I have already referred to the remote kinship between 
Judge Hoar and myself. Joanna Hoar was our common 
ancestress, — perhaps I might say that we were both of 
"the tribe of Joanna,"^ — and of Joanna Hoar I now pro- 
pose to speak. The widow of Charles Hoar, for a time, 
during the reign of one of the earlier English Stuarts, 
sheriff of Gloucester, Joanna Hoar came to New England 
in 1640, bringing with her five children. But her story, as 
will presently appear, has been best told, and that very re- 
cently, by another. Suffice it now to say that one daughter 
of Joanna Hoar, called after her mother, married in due 
time Edmund Quincy, second of the name in New Eng- 
land, and familiar to us in the pages of Sewall as " Unckle 
Quinsey," that "true New England man." They had a son, 
Daniel, to whom, in 1689, was born a son, John. This John 
Quincy lived until 1765, and then dying, bequeathed his name 
to a great-grandson, just born, the child of his granddaughter, 
Abigail Smith, who a year previous had married the young 
Braintree law3'er, John Adams. While Judge Hoar there- 
fore was descended in the seventh generation from the original 
Joanna in the direct male line, the descent of the family of 
which I am a member was through a succession of females, — 
Joanna Quincy, Elizabeth Smith, and Abigail Adams. Never- 
theless, we were offshoots of a common stock ; and for Joanna 
Hoar, the widow with five children who came to New England 
in 1640, Judge Hoar felt a deep and abiding reverence truly 
characteristic of the man. Of this he recently gave proof in 
connection with that College of which the son of Joanna Hoar 
was the third President. 

Though in no degree wealthy, Judge Hoar was a liberal, 
freely giving man ; in proportion to means, few more so. He 
had, too, a strong feeling for his Alma Mater, — a devotion. 
His liberality and this devotion bore fruits in full measure to 

1 I have elsewhere (Tliree Episodes of Massaolmsetts History, pp. G03, 704-706) 
had occasion to point out how curiously prolific of noticeable men " tlie tribe 
of Joanna " has proved. To tliis earlier reference of mine the injunction of Judge 
Hoar was probably attributable. 



14 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

the College on one important occasion. President Eliot is my 
authority for the anecdote. Once, when at some dinner I 
found myself next to Mr. Eliot, — in the course of conversa- 
tion I referred to the large subscription by its alumni after the 
great Boston fire of 1872, to make good the losses Harvard 
College then sustained. I spoke with genuine admiration of 
it as a stroke of genius on his part, that then, while Boston 
was still smoking in ruins, before the extent of its loss was 
measured, while its sons knew not what, if anything, might 
still remain to them, — even then, hardly yet in the morrow 
of calamity, realizing the truth that when men are most 
deeply moved they most freely give, he, as representing the 
College, had had the audacity as well as the true insight to 
call for free-will offerings at once, to make good the losses Har- 
vard had sustained. The result of the call many here doubt- 
less remember. The alumni seemed to open their purses as 
never before ; money flowed from them like water. Harvard 
College rose like a phoenix from the smoking ashes of Boston. 
The President listened to my comments on this, as I jest- 
ingly termed it to him, Napoleonic stroke of mendicancy, and 
then proceeded to explain how it came about. It was all very 
natural. He told me that a day or two after the fire he, the 
Treasurer of the College, and I think one other member of the 
Corporation, were seated in the Treasurer's office, computing as 
well as they then could the extent of the calamity, and look- 
ing each other in the face in blank dismay. The disaster 
seemed fairly irretrievable. Footsteps, he said, were then 
heard on the stairs outside, and, opening the door. Judge Hoar 
came in. He had in his hand a bond, railroad or otherwise, 
just taken apparently from his box, and with as deep a feeling 
as he ever allowed himself to show, he proceeded to say that 
he considered he owed everything to Harvard College, — a 
debt nothing he could do or give would ever repay; that he 
saw she had been one of the heaviest losers by the fire, and 
now stood in need of help ; and so, as one of her children, he 
had brought in his contribution now ; and, so saying, he handed 
the bond to the Treasurer. Some one else, I do not remember 
who, presently appeared that day on the same errand ; and, 
added the President, it then occurred to me that if these two 
felt thus, others probably felt the same wa)^, and an immediate 
public appeal for aid was decided upon. The blow thus struck 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 



16 



was timed exactly. Within sixty days more tliaii 8180,000 
poured in upon the astonished Treasurer. 

But it was at a later day, indeed only recently, that Judge 
Hoar's combined veneration for Joanna Hoar and his love for 
the College found most characteristic expression in a similar 
generous way. The Harvard Annex, as it was called, last 
year developed into Radcliffe College. Shortly after my return 
from a trip to Europe, nearly six months ago, Judge Hoar 
drove over to my house in Lincoln one bright September 
Sunday, and after some ])leasant talk drew from his pocket a 
paper which he proceeded to read to me. Dated from Quincy, 
where Joanna Hoar lies buried in the ancient graveyard by 
the side of her son Leonard,^ it was a supposed communication 
from her, written in the quaint olden style and addressed to 
Mrs. Agassiz, the President of Radcliffe, conveying a gift of 
S5000 to endow a scholarship to assist in the education of 
girls at the College, "preference always to be given to natives, 
or daughters of citizens of Concord," and to bear as an endow- 
ment the name of " The Widow Joanna Hoar." 

The whole correspondence as it took place has since been 
printed in the first annual report (1894) of the President of 

1 Our associate George Frisbie Hoar has recently caused a fresh tablet to be 
placed over the spot where Joanna Hoar, and the widow of her son, Leonard 
Hoar, are buried : it bears the following inscriptions : — 

BRIDGET 

WIDOW OF PRESIDENT 

LEONARD HOAR, 

DIED MAY 25, 1723. 

DAUGHTER OF 

JOHN LORD LISLE, 

PRESIDENT OF THE 

HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE, 

LORD COMMISSIONER OF 

THE GREAT SEAL, WHO 

DREW THE INDICTMENT 

AND SENTENCE OF 

KING CHARLES I., AND 

WAS MURDERED AT 

LAUSANNE, AUG. 11^^^ 1664. 

AND OF LADY ALICIA LISLE, 

WHO AVAS BEHEADED BY 

THE BRUTAL JUDGMENT 

OF JEFFRIES IN 1685 ; 

SHE WAS NEARLY AKIN 

BY MARRIAGE TO 
LORD WILLIAM RUSSELL. 



JOANNA HOAR 

DIED IN BRAINTREE, 

DECEMBER 21^^^ 1661. 

SHE WAS WIDOW OF 

CHARLES HOAR 

SHERIFF OF 

GLOUCESTER, ENGLAND, 

WHO DIED 1638. 

SHE CAME TO 

NEW ENGLAND, 

WITH FIVE CHILDREN 

ABOUT 1640. 



16 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

Radcliffe. Though it can there be found, it is so charmingly 
and humorously expressed, it is so thoroughly, so kindly char- 
acteristic of Judge Hoar in his riper days, and withal of such 
genuine historical interest, that I ask permission to reproduce 
it here in full, so giving to it such permanence of re(3ord as 
may come from its incorporation into the published Proceed- 
ings of this Society. At the close of his last contribution to 
the correspondence. Judge Hoar, still keeping up an air of 
supposed mystery, and ignoring his own connection with the 
gift, says that he has stated the case to his brother, our asso- 
ciate, Senator Hoar, and to myself, as two of Joanna Hoar's 
descendants of the present time, and adds : " They look intelli- 
gent, but promise nothing ; though both are members of the 
Historical Society, and perhaps know more than they choose to 
tell." 

Altogether it was a delightful bit of fanciful correspondence, 
kindly as well as reverentially conceived, and most charmingly 
carried out ; and our old friend enjoyed it keenly. It appealed 
to his sense of humor. .He chose to give with an unseen hand, 
and to build his memorial to his first New England ancestor in 
his own peculiar way. He is dead now ; and I feel that I 
commit no breach of confidence in thus obeying his last injunc- 
tion to me, though, in so doing, I no longer merely look intelli- 
gent, but here openly tell all I know. 



The extract from the report of the President of Radcliffe College 
referred to in Mr. Adams's remarks is as follows : — 

In conclusion, let me add that the new aspect of our institution has 
already awakened a fresh interest in Radcliffe College, and we have 
received in consequence private donations as well as bequests and scholar- 
ships. Details respecting these gifts will be found in the Treasurer's 
Report. I wish, however, to make special mention of one recently 
endowed scholarship, because the manner of the gift brings it into a cer- 
tain ideal relation with the scholarship presented by Ann Radcliffe to 
Harvard College some two hundred and fifty years ago. 

The story which suggests this association is so charmingly told by the 
true donor (the gift remaining, however, strictly anonymous) that I think 
I cannot fail to gratify my readers by incorporating it in this report. 

Elizabeth C. Agassiz. 

At the time that the following letter was received in Cambridge, a 
gift of two thousand dollars, without name of giver, was received by 
the Treasurer in Boston. A subsequent anonymous gift raised the sum 
to five thousand dollars. 



EBENEZEK R. HOAR. 17 

QciNCV, Sept. 12, 1894. 
To Mistress Louis Agassiz, 

President of Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massachusetts. 

Honored and Gkacious Lady, — This epistle is addres.sed to you from 
Quincy, because in the part of Braintree which now bears that name, in 
the burial place by the meeting-house, all that was mortal of me was 
laid to rest more than two centuries ago, and the gravestone stands which 
bears ni^' name, and marks the spot where my dust reposes. 

It may cau.se you surprise to be thus addressed, and that tlie work which 
you are pursuing with such constancy and success is of interest to one who 
so long ago passed from the mortal sight of men. But you may i-ecall 
that wise philosophers have believed and taught that those who have 
striven to do tlieir Lord's will here below do not, when transfeired to his 
house ou high, thereby become wholly regardless of what may befall those 
who come after them, — " nee, hnec coelestia spectanles, ista terrestria con- 
temnunt.''^ It is a comforting faith that those who have "gone forth 
weeping, bearing precious seed," shall be permitted to see and share the 
joys of tlie harvest with their successors who gather it. 

I was a contemporary of the pious and bountiful Lady Radcliffe, for 
whom your College is named. My honored husband, Charles Iloar, 
Sheriff of Gloucester in England, by his death in 1638, left me a widow 
with six children. We were of the people called by their revilers Puritans, 
to whom civil liberty, sound learning, and religion were very dear. The 
times were troublous in England, and the hands of princes and prelates 
were heavy upon God's people. j\Iy thoughts were turned to the new 
England where precious Mr. John Harvard had just lighted that little 
candle which has since thi-own its beams so far, where there seemed a 
providential refuge for those who desired a church without a Bishop, and 
a state without a King. 

I did not, therefore, like the worshii)ful Lady Radcliffe, send a contribu- 
tion in money ; but I came hither myself, bringing the five youngest of my 
children witli me, and arrived at Braintree in the year 1640. 

From that day Harvard College has been much in my mind ; and I 
humbly trust that my coming has not been without some furtherance to 
its well being. My lamented husband in his will directed that our 
youngest son, Leonard, siiould be " caref ullie kept at Schoole, and when 
hee is fitt for itt to be carefullie placed at Oxford, and if ye Lord shall see 
fitt, to make him a Minister unto his people." As the nearest practicable 
conformity to this direction, I placed him carefully at Harvard College, to 
such purpose that he graduated therefrom in 16.30, became a faithful 
minister to God's people, a capable physician to heal their bodily diseases, 
and became the third President of the College, and the first who was a 
graduate from it, in 1672. 

My daughters became the wives of the Rev. Henry Flint, the minister 
of Braintree, and Col. Ednmnd Quincy of the same town: and it is 
recorded that from their descendants another President has since been 
raised up to the College, Josiah Quincy (tam carum caput), and a Pro- 
fessor of Rhetoric and Oratory, John Quincy Adams, who as well as his 
sons and grandsons have given much aid to the College, as members of one 

3 



18 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

or the other of its governing boards, beside attaining other distinctions 
less to my present purpose. 

The elder of my three sons who came with me to America, John Hoar, 
settled in the extreme western frontier town of English settlement in 
New England, called Concord: to which that exemplary Christian man, 
the Reverend Peter Bulkeley, had brought his flock in 1635. In Mr. 
Bulkeley's ponderous theological treatise, called " The Gospel Covenant," 
of which two editions were published in London (but whether it be so 
generally and constantly perused and studied at the present day as it was 
in my time, I know not), — in the preface thereto, he says it was written 
" at the end of the earth." There my son and his posterity have dwelt 
and multiplied, and the love and service of the College which I should 
approve have not been wholly wanting among them. In so remote a place 
there must be urgent need of instruction, though the report seems to be 
well founded that settlements farther westward have since been made, 
and that some even of my own posterity have penetrated the continent to 
the shores of the Pacific Sea. Among the descendants of John Hoar have 
been that worthy Professor John Farrar, whose beautiful face in marble 
is among the precious possessions of the College; that dear and faithful 
woman who gave the whole of her humble fortune to establish a scholar- 
ship therein, Levina Hoar; and others who as Fellows or Overseers have 
done what they could for its prosperity and growth. 

Pardon my prolixity, but the story I have told is but a prelude to my 
request of your kindness. There is no authentic mode in which departed 
souls can impart their wishes to those who succeed them in this world but 
these, the record or memory of their thoughts and deeds while on earth ; 
or the reappearance of their qualities of mind and character in their lineal 
descendants. 

In this first year of Radcliffe College, — when, so far as seems practicable 
and w ise, the advantages which our dear Harvard College, " the defiance 
of the Puritan to the savage and the wilderness," has so long bestowed 
upon her sons, are through your means to be shared by the sisters and 
daughters of our people, — if it should so befall that funds for a scholar- 
ship to assist in the education of girls at Radcliffe College, who need 
assistance, with preference always to be given to natives, or daughters of 
citizens of Concord, Massachusetts, should be placed in the hands of your 
Treasurer, you might well suppose that memory of me had induced some 
of my descendants to spare so much from their necessities for such a 
modest memorial : and I would humbly ask that the scholarship may bear 
the name of 

The Widow Joaxna Hoar. 

And may God establish the good work you have in charge ! 

In reply, this letter was addressed to one of the descendants of 
Joanna Hoar : — 

QoiNCY St., Cambridge, Oct. 11, 1894. 

Dear Sir, — Very recently I received the most gracious communication 
from the far past, written with the mingled dignity and grace which we 
are wont to associate with our ladies of the olden time, yet not without a 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 19 

certain modernness which showed that she still keeps in touch with wliat is 
valuable in our day and generation. Through me she sends greeting to 
the young Radcliffe College, and a most generous gift to aid in the work 
for the education of women in which that institution is engaged. 

A doubt as to the best way of acknowledging tiie gift and the sympathy 
it represents has kept me silent till now. But a friend suggests that you 
might put us in the way of reaching that gentle Joanna Hoar who speaks 
across the lapse of time so cordially and sweetly. In that case will you 
express, if not to her, to some of her living descendants, the thanks 
of Radcliffe College for the scholarship which she has so generously 
endowed ? 

Perhaps I may be allowed to add my own respectful gratitude for her 
valued letter to me. 

With great regard, most cordially yours, 

Elizabeth C. Agassiz. 

Letter from a Descendant of the Widoiv Joanna Hoar. 

Concord, Massachusetts, Oct. 15, 1894. 

Dear Mrs. Agassiz, — I am honored by the receipt of your courteous 
letter. If, as 1 suppose, the Joanna Hoar to whom you refer is a lady from 
whom I am descended, I know no means of communicating with her. 
Even the messenger entrusted by the Post Office with a " special delivery " 
letter might decline to risk the chances of getting back, if he were to 
undertake the delivery in person. So I adopted the other alternative 
which you suggest, and stated the case to two of her most conspicuous 
descendants of our time. Senator George F. Hoar, of Worcester, and Mr. 
Charles F. Adams, who has recently removed from Quincy to a house in 
Lincoln, just on the borders of Concord. 

They look intelligent, but promise nothing ; though both are members 
of the Historical Society, and perhaps know more than they choose to 
tell. 

I am glad, however, that the old lady contrived a way to send Radcliffe 
a gift with her greeting. 

Very faithfully yours, 

Mrs. Elizabeth Agassiz. 

The Hon. Walbridge A. Field, having been called on, 
said : — 

There are many men here who knew Judge Hoar longer 
and better than I, and who could better express the esteem in 
which he was held by the members of this Society and by 
the community. I first knew Judge Hoar by sight when he 
was appointed a judge of the Supreme Judicial Court of 
Massachusetts, and after 1869 I knew him well. Of his life 
before his appointment to that bench I know only what 
everybody knows, — his admission to the bar, his appoint- 
ment to the bench of the Court of Common Pleas, his resigna- 



20 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

tion from that bench, and his practice of law in Boston until 
he became a judge of the Supreme Judicial Court. Of his 
political life before that time I know only that he was a 
strong antislavery man who had been a Whig, and that he 
had taken part in an attempted organization of a Free Soil 
party. His published opinions while a judge on our Supreme 
Court, where he continued for nearly ten years, are the best 
evidence of the kind of judge he was. Those opinions, as a 
rule, are not long ; tliey begin directly with the discussion of 
the questions of law involved ; they are exceedingly clear ; 
the analysis of the case is perfect ; authorities are cited when 
necessary, but there is no great display of authorities ; and 
the opinion ends when the argument ends, and there is robust 
good sense manifest throughout. There is no attempt at dis- 
play, and very little discussion of subjects that might be inter- 
esting but are not strictly necessary to the decision. The 
reporter informs me that his opinions were always carefully 
written out in his own handwriting, ready for the printer, 
that he never corrected them after they were filed, did not 
care to see the printed proofs, and that apparently he dis- 
missed them from his mind when they had been approved. I 
am informed that he rarel}' made more than one draught ; that 
he formulated what he had to say in his mind befoie he wrote 
anything, and that he made very few changes in the revision. 
I think he had never been in the habit of dictating to a ste- 
nographer until he was Attorney-General, but he then dictated 
long opinions which were sent to the other departments often 
without the change of a word. I tried a few cases before 
him, as well when he was sitting at riisi prius as on the 
bench ; and it was impossible not to notice the quickness of 
his perceptions, the keenness of his logic, and his dislike of 
any conduct in a cause which was not directly pertinent to 
the issues and did not throw light upon the tiial. He had 
the impatience natural to very quick minds at the slow pro- 
cesses of duller men, and he especially disliked any indirec- 
tion, any arguments that missed the point of the case, and 
any pretensions and affectations of thought or feeling that 
were intended or were likely to mislead. I think no jury 
ever left their seats under his instructions without having 
clearly and forcibly presented to them the exact issues to 
be determined. 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 21 

While be remained upon the bench, Chief Justice Bigelow 
resigned. Governor Bullock nominated Ex-Judc^e Thomas to 
that office, but he was rejected by the Council, and Judge 
Chapman was appointed. Judge Thomas had been appointed 
a justice in 1853, and had resigned in 1859 to practise law in 
Boston, and Judge -Hoar had been appointed a justice in his 
place. It was felt by the friends of Judge Hoar at that time, 
and I think by tlie bar generally, then and since, that Judge 
Hoar ought to have been appointed. This was in 1868. How 
much or how little this incident had to do with Judge Hoar's 
acceptance of the appointment of Attorney-General in March, 

1869, by President Grant, I do not know. It seems to me not 
unlikely that if he had then been ajipointed chief justice, he 
would have remained upon the bench of our Supreme Court 
until he died. When Chief Justice Chapman died. Governor 
Washburn offered the appointment to Judge Hoar, but he 
declined it. He was appointed Attorney-General by President 
Grant, and he qualified on the 10th day of March, 1869, and 
held the office until his resignation in the latter part of June, 

1870. I was invited by him to be the Assistant Attorney- 
General assigned to his office, and from the latter part of 
April, 1869, until his resignation, I held that office. Part of 
the time I roomed in the same house with him, and sat at 
the same table. I then became very well acquainted with 
him, and came to have great regard for him. 

The condition of affairs when General Grant became Presi- 
dent it may be well enough to recall. All the seceding States 
had not been readmitted to representation in Congress. Vir- 
ginia, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas were still governed as 
military districts. The State governments in many of the 
seceding States which had been reorganized were not such as 
to command much respect. President Johnson had not been 
the wisest of presidents, and his appointments to the civil ser- 
vice had often been bad. The Fifteenth Amendment of the 
Constitution of the United States had not yet been ratified ; 
there was some doubt of the ability of the United States to pay 
its debt ; and the financial laws necessary to uphold the credit 
of the United States, and ultimately to insure the resump- 
tion of specie payment had not been passed. The Johnson- 
Clarendon treaty between the United States and Great 
Britain had been rejected by the Senate. Mr. Sumner had 



22. TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP 

delivered in the Senate what I consider a very intemperate 
speech against it which had been made public, and the chances 
for successful negotiation with Great Britain were not favor- 
able. There was an insurrection in Cuba, and the President 
was urged by many men in public life to acknowledge the bel- 
ligerent rights of the insurgents, with a view of making Cuba 
independent of Spain and ultimately annexing her to the 
United States. Before the war the acquisition of Cuba had 
been a part of the policy of the Democratic party. President 
Buchanan, both before and after he became President, had 
urged the acquisition of Cuba by purchase, with the intima- 
tion that if it could not be bought it might be necessary to 
take it by force, and Spain was very suspicious of the inten- 
tions of the United States. It became necessary for Judge 
Hoar as Attorney-General immediately to take part in the 
consideration of political questions of the gravest character ; 
and it has, I think, always been considered that he acquitted 
himself with distinction. His opinion as Attorney-General in 
the case of James Weaver, upon the jurisdiction of a military 
commission sitting in Texas in the year 1868 to try and to 
sentence to death a person not in the military or naval service, 
is an example of the unusual character of some of the matters 
with which he had to deal. The statutes passed during the 
war were being brought before the Supreme Court of the 
United States for the purpose of testing their constitutionality, 
and as Attorney-General he argued all the important cases 
which were argued during his term of office. Hepburn v. 
Griswold, the first case involving the constitutionality of the 
legal tender acts, was decided while he held the office, but it 
was argued by his predecessor, and the subsequent legal ten- 
der cases were argued after he left the office, so that he took 
no part in the arguments upon the constitutionality of the 
legal tender acts ; but he argued, for example, Veazie Bank v. 
Fenno, The Justices v. Murray, and the cases involving the 
constitutionality of the confiscation acts, although these were 
afterward reargued, and his name does not appear in the 
reports. 

It was during his term of office that nine circuit judges 
were appointed and two justices of the Supreme Court of the 
United States. The Attorney-General's office was not changed 
into the Department of Justice until after he left it. That 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 23 

change increased the clerical force of the office, and cre- 
ated the office of Solicitor-General ; but in Judge Hoar's 
time the office had hardly the clerical force necessary to the 
efficient performance of its work. Taken suddenly, without 
warning, from the bench of the Supreme Judicial Court, 
into such an office as that, with all its political business and 
appointments in addition to what may be called its strictly 
law work, he found it a very great change ; but he was more 
than equal to it. The first thing that struck me was the 
remarkable quickness with which he saw through intricate and 
involved cases. I have never known anjdjody, I tliink, whose 
insight was quicker, more penetrating, or surer. I have 
known a few men who were as profound lawyers as he ; one 
or two, perhaps, who would consider a case with a wider com- 
prehension of all its bearings, but none who could see so much 
at the first glance. His aspect was somewhat stern, and he 
made a remark now and then that seemed ungracious, but on 
the whole he was as satisfactory a man to serve under as I 
ever worked with. I found him to be a very kind-hearted 
man. He was reall}'^ very considerate to all the clerks in the 
office, although his manner at first frightened them. He 
turned nobody out, although there were one or two that I 
found rather trying. 

Some time after Judge Hoar resigned he was appointed one 
of the commissioners for the negotiation of the treaty of Wasli- 
ington, and was associated with Mr, Fish, the Secretary of 
State, General Schenck, our minister plenipotentiary to Great 
Britain, Judge Nelson, of the Supreme Court, and Mr. 
Williams, afterwards Attorney-General of the United States. 
The whole subject of our relations with Great Britain was 
often discussed at cabinet meetings while Judge Hoar was 
Attorney-General, and liis views were well known to the 
President. I have reason to believe that the President had 
a strong liking for him and great confidence in his judgment. 
I think that it was somewhat annoying to Judge Hoar that in 
these discussions and the subsequent ones that resulted in the 
treaty he could receive little or no aid from the senior Senator 
of Massachusetts. President Grant throughout, as it hap- 
pened, maintained a strict non-interference with the affairs of 
Cuba, and enforced the neutrality laws; and in this he was 
supported very urgently by Judge Hoar. It is well known 



24 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

that President Grant thought we should have some possessions 
in the West India Islands, and, while preserving strict neu- 
trality about Cuba, was eager to acquire San Domingo. This 
policy was begun while Judge Hoar was Attorney-General, 
but it was more clearly shown by occurrences well known to 
the public which happened after Judge Hoar left office. Al- 
though I have no positive knowledge of Judge Hoar's position 
on the subject, I believe that he did not favor this policy of 
the President. It was during his term of office that he was 
nominated by the President as Justice of the Supreme Court 
of the United States and was rejected by the Senate. This 
rejection did not involve any reflections upon the ability or 
character of Judge Hoar, but I shall not attempt to give a full 
account of it. For one thing, I have not sufficient knowledge. 
It may be said, however, that in carrying out his ideas of the 
proper manner of performing the duties of his office in mak- 
ing appointments he had thwarted a good many of the wishes 
of the public men in Washington. His manners were com- 
plained of, too ; and it is true, I think, that his manner of 
speech had sometimes given offence. Coming from the 
Supreme Court of Massachusetts, where the traditional man- 
ners then were somewhat brusque, and transported into an 
entirely different sphere, he certainly did not always show 
that graciousness of speech which robs a refusal of a great 
part of its sting. He never seemed to me to lack tact in 
the management of grave affairs, where the persons inter- 
ested were more intent upon things than upon forms, and 
personal considerations were not important ; but he cer- 
tainly had not the art of influencing men by conciliating 
or flattering them. The truth is, that at that tiuie a propo- 
sition to do something which he thought ought not to be 
done struck him at first with surprise and indignation. If 
he could restrain his speech long enough to see the humor 
of the thing, he got along well enough ; but if he spoke 
at once wliat he thought, it was apt to be severe. It is 
useless to speculate upon what would have been his life if 
he had been confirmed as Justice of the Supreme Court of 
the United States. His natural place v/as to be a judge ; 
he had the character and ability requisite for a great judge. 
If he had been made a justice on that bench, he probably 
would not have been assigned to the first circuit, certainly 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 25 

not while Judge Clifford lived. He probably would liave 
been assigned to some Southern circuit, which would have 
removed him from Concord a great part of the time. How 
long he could have lived out of New England, or how 
much he would have enjo3'ed it, and what would have been 
the eifect upon his opinions and character of long-continued 
contact with new men and new forms of society, can only 
be conjectured. After he came back from Washington he 
resumed the practice of law in Boston, and except when 
acting in the negotiation of the treaty of Washington and 
serving in the House of Representatives at Washington during 
one term, he continued to practise law until a few months 
before he died. He occasionally tried cases before a jury, but 
most of his cases were before the court. I have heard him 
address a jury, and he was an effective advocate. Beside the 
power of clear and forcible statement he had strong feelings, 
and could by short pathetic appeals excite the emotions of a 
jury where it was appropriate to the case. Still his arguments 
were mainly before the court, and they were like his opinions, 
— not long, very clear, remarkably strong in the analysis of 
the exact points involved in them, and persuasive in their 
sound sense. His style always clearly and sharply expressed 
his thought. 

I do not think he was a very laborious man. I doubt 
whether he ever in his life sat down and said to himself, 
" This is a great cause, and I will write the very best opinion 
or make the very best argument I can, and take all the time 
necessary for preparation." He did not like the manual labor 
of writing, and he was wholly averse to that elaboration of rhe- 
torical statement which was perhaps the prevailing fashion in 
Massachusetts when he was in college. He liked directness, 
simplicity, and, except for the wit with which he pointed or 
enlivened the argument, he left it bald of decorations. I 
think you can find nothing of his which has been published in 
which you can see that he took great pains with the form of 
it, otherwise than to make as clear as possible what he thought 
and felt. There are some lawyers who think it great piaise 
that they have never held public office, and have confined 
themselves strictly to their profession. Judge Hoar desired 
no such praise. He had the old New England notion that it 
was a man's duty, and a commendable ambition in any one, to 

4 



26 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

take such part in public affairs as came to him. He remained 
in Concord, the home of his father, but wherever he might 
have settled he would have taken the same interest in town 
affairs. He took an active interest in politics always, although 
the only elective political offices he ever held were those of 
Senator in the State Senate, of Representative in Congress for 
a single term, and of Presidential Elector. But he was inter- 
ested not alone in politics ; he was a devoted friend of his col- 
lege, and served her faithfully. He was interested in everything 
human. Although an antislavery man from the beginning, 
and a Unitarian in religion, I think he must be regarded on 
the whole as a conservative man in his general character. I 
do not remember that he ever broached any scheme of philan- 
thropy or of politics which he thought was a panacea for 
our social or political ills. He alwa3's seemed to me anxious 
to preserve the best institutions and the best habits of New 
England life, and to make the most of them. After he came 
back to Boston he had, I think, all the law practice he 
wanted ; it was of the best kind, and took all of his time that 
he wished to give to his profession. I do not think he would 
have enjoyed an overwhelmingly large practice. He wished 
time for seeing his friends, and for meditating upon many 
things, and for enjoying many things, and for reading what 
he chose. He was always famous for his wit. He had as 
pronounced an individuality as Benjamin Franklin or John 
Adams or Charles Lamb or Thomas Carlyle. I remember 
when in Washington a gentleman said to me, " Some of the 
most eminent public men in Washington from New England 
do not seem to me to be what I had supposed the Yankee to 
be"; and he mentioned Mr. Webster and Mr. Choate. I said 
that Mr. Webster was a good enough New Englander, although 
he might have been born anywhere of English parents ; Mr. 
Choate, I admitted, had not many New England characteris- 
tics. Judge Hoar could not be mistaken. His whole con- 
versation and manner showed the soil from which he sprang. 
He had the shrewd judgment of the New Englander, and the 
faculty of characterizing a man or a cause b}' an epithet or a 
phrase, in a strictly Yankee way. It was the nimbleness of 
his wit as well as the sincerity of his character that endeared 
him so much to that bright set of literary men whose com- 
panion he was. In a running conversation his wit appeared 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 27 

constantl}'. It was unpremeditated, sudden, and every way 
his own. I am told tliat he kept no memoranda of fine say- 
ino;s, but lie had a remarkable memory for anything striking 
or felicitous in speech which he had ever heard or read, — and 
he had read much, but I think in rather a desultory way. He 
read what he liked to read. He delighted to gratify his mind. 
Judge Hoar as I knew him was an aggressive man in his 
opinions, and had some of the defects of his qualities. I have 
seen men more tolerant than he, and of more catholic judg- 
ments. He was unflinching in the maintenance of any cause 
which he had much at heart, and he could hardly forgive per- 
sons who he thought deliberately acted in violation of their 
own sense of right. He grew more tolerant as he grew 
older, but still he always preserved fidelity to his own con- 
victions, cost what it might. The men who knew him best 
liked him best, and he was a delightful companion. It was 
only on acquaintance that you could find out how tender- 
hearted he was, how generous he was, how considerate 
he was to those whom he thought deserving. He had the 
habit of repressing any exhibition of feeling, which we all 
know was one characteristic of the old New Englander, and 
he took great satisfaction in doing good by stealth. He 
meant to live his own life. He was about the best specimen 
we had of a witty, wise, courageous, public-spirited, God- 
fearing New England lawyer. 

The Recording Secretary then read the following letter 
which had been received from the Hon. Jacob D. Cox, of 
Ohio, a Corresponding Member : — 

Cincinnati, 4 February, 1895. 
Hon. C. F. Adams, President of the Massachusetts Historical Society. 

My dear Sir, — Learning from Mr. E. L. Pierce that the approach- 
ing meeting of the Society will probably be a commemorative one, 
when the death of our fellow-member the Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar 
will be fitly noticed, I venture to make some mention of my personal 
and intimate relations to him in 1869-70, and of my estimate of 
his character. 

We met in "Washington about the 6th of March at the beginning of 
General Grant's first term as President. He had been appointed 
Attorney- General and I Secretary of the Interior, and I believe that 
neither of us had the slightest warning of the appointment till it waa 



28 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

publicly announced that our names had been sent to the Senate. Sum- 
moned thus unexpectedly to public duty, we were not prepared to 
transfer our households to the capital at once, and I was very glad to 
accept the invitation of Mr. Hoar to join him in a temporary occupa- 
tion of the house of Mr. Twitchell, a member of the House from INIas- 
sachusetts, which would be unoccupied during the spring and summer. 
The house was in charge of a young married pair from New England, 
the husband being a teacher in the Freedmen's Bureau Schools, and 
we were thus able to step at once into a home-like and comfortable 
establishment. 

It had for me, however, the far more fortunate and important result, 
that I was thus thrown at once into the closest personal association 
with Judge Hoar, both in our duties in the Cabinet and in our leisure 
hours. The house was near the Capitol ; and Mr. ELvarts (who, as 
you know, is a cousin of Judge Hoar) was often the Judge's guest 
when his business with the Supreme Court called him to Washington. 
It goes without saying that whoever was permitted to be of the party 
when such men met under such circumstances enjoyed nodes am- 
hrosiance equal to any that Kit North described. 

The common impression that Judge Hoar had a wit that was too tart 
to be genial, has always seemed to me very like the other notion quite 
prevalent forty or fifty years ago that Thackeray was a cynical writer, 
— an error in which the responsibility for the misjudgment must be 
laid at the door of those who lacked the ear to catch tlie subtle tone of 
sympathy vibrating from the very heart, or the eye to see the merry 
twinkle which accompanied the words which glittered with so keen 
an edge. 

A truer and more unselfish friendship, a heartier accord with all that 
is right and true, a warmer sympathy with whatever makes for prog- 
ress and tends to level men upward, was never seen. The playfully 
mocking air covered pity and kindness of the most thorough sort. 
The humorous or sarcastic turn of a phrase covered a heart that was 
thoroughly earnest, and full of most steady and fixed purpose. 

In official consultations he made a public labor as attractive as a 
social feast, whilst his opinions were as weighty and his judgment as 
solid and as helpful as if no flash of wit ever illumined his thoi;ght. 
The wild-apple " tang," as Thoreau calls it, which gave his thoughts 
and words a native character of their own, made him an unfailing 
source of joy to all who knew him well, whilst his solid powers and 
bis thorough cultivation of every faculty of mind made him wisely 
instructive, and intellectually powerful in every sphere of action. As 
a judge, his racy wit gave new aptness to the sound application of old 
principles. As a Cabinet officer, he touched the very marrow of the 
question under discussion. As a member of an important diplomatic 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 29 

commission, be knew how to cut sheer through the most tangled logic 
in a way to amuse and delight even those who found their sophistries 
scattered to the winds. 

Massachusetts has reason to be proud of the memory of a noble list 
of men who have kept good the promise of the great characters of 
their colonial ancestors, and Judge Hoar's place is a safe one among 
them. For traits of native quality, improved but not lost in the re- 
finements of modern education ; for hearty love of right and for sturdy 
and unflinching support of it ; for readiness to help every good cause 
and a strong mind and will to make his help valuable ; for purity of 
heart and sincere reverence for all that is divinely taught, — he was a 
man for his country to be proud of, and for his friends to model their 
own lives upon. 

Faithfully yours, J. D. Cox. 

Mr. Henry Lee said : — 

" Behold there come seven years of great plenty throughout 
all the land of Egypt : and there shall arise after them seven 
years of famine." 

At our last meeting but one Dr. Ellis was speaking words 
of lament at the loss of Mr. Winthrop ; a month later, stunned 
by the news of his sudden death, we came together to mourn 
him. This loss upon loss makes us poor indeed. 

A few years ago we had the pleasure of beholding among us 
Emerson, Deane, Lowell, Parkraan, Holmes, Winthrop, and 
Ellis, — these were our years of great plenty ; now the last of 
them has gone, and the years of famine have come upon us. 
When such men are withdrawn, the sadness of personal 
bereavement is followed by dismay over our deferred inten- 
tions, our lost opportunities. We can never know, we cannot 
estimate, we can only conjecture, what garnered secrets of the 
past have been buried with them, which might have been 
revealed had their lives been prolonged, or extorted by us 
had we been more vigilant. 

Now we vainly regret that we had not, like Joseph, gathered 
up the food of the seven years of plenty. 

For while there are many untiring scholars flashing their 
searchlights upon obscure passages in our history and illumi- 
nating them for us, they have never seen the unsullied, unin- 
vaded New England pictured by Emerson in his historical 
discourse at Concord and in his memoir of Dr. Ezra Ripley, 



30 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

by Holmes and Lowell in divers places, and loved and studied 
and set before us by Winthrop and Deane and Ellis. They 
were the representatives of a vanished age ; in their brief life- 
time the transformation of centuries has been accomplished : 
the peaceful, farming, maritime New England has passed away, 
only to be conjured up by realizing their descriptions, and 
shutting eyes and ears to the unwelcome intrusion of the 
bustling, heterogeneous present. 

To-day we are called upon to grieve over the departure of a 
true Puritan. Leaving to others an estimate of his rare ability, 
of his professional eminence, of his patriotic public service, I 
dwell on certain salient traits which have perhaps masked 
more fundamental elements of his character. 

Gazing into the grave of an old friend, one may get a blurred 
image; so I recur, on this occasion, to a portrait drawn by me 
twenty years ago, when he was candidate for the United States 
Senate : — 

" At the Republican conference Tuesday evening, Mr. Shortle of 
Provincetown said that no man who could only be approached by those 
within certain walks of life, who represented not the Republican party, 
but only a peculiar shade of blood, a few families on Beacon Street, 
would get his vote. Now, if Mr. Shortle knows Judge Hoar at all, 
even by hearsay, he must have been aware he was talking non- 
sense. As to Beacon Street, living there is a presumption of wealth, 
nothing more ; in some cases inherited, in most earned, — by some hon- 
estly, by others dishonestly, — and spent wisely or unwisely, frugally or 
lavishly, according to the disposition of the holder. Of over four hun- 
dred householders only five live in the houses in which they were born. 
The blood is pretty much what it is throughout Massachusetts, — that of 
the early settlers filtered through several generations of varied fortunes 
and occupations, of good and evil report. 

" But whatever the merits or demerits of the dwellers in Beacon 
Street, who are only distinguished by that success in money-getting 
which Mr. Shortle and the majority of men strive for. Judge Hoar will 
be amused to learn that he is their representative. I have known him 
well for forty-two years, and I have often qualified my praise of him by 
charging him with an undue severity on city men and city waj^s, an 
almost aggressive simplicity and disregard of the little graces. 

" If one wants to see Puritan principles carried into practice, let him 
visit Concord and witness the noble frugality and quiet dignity of that 
small circle of highly endowed and highly educated men and women to 
which Judge Hoar belongs, and which is characterized by those virtues 
eas}' to admire, hard to practise, even by Mr. Shortle." 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 31 

After this lapse of time the record stands approved ; liis 
undue severity on city men and city ways, his aggressive sim- 
plicity and disregard of the little graces, as well as his plain 
living and high thinking, have still characterized him. 

I once addressed him as the incarnation of the State of 
Massachusetts in general, and Middlesex County in particular; 
and so he was. 

Born in Concord, the wilderness town, consecrated by the 
piety and generosity of its well-born founder, the Rev. Peter 
Bulkeley ; made picturesque by the brotherly reconciliation of 
the gentle Winthrop and stern old Dudley; and illustrated, 
not only by the "shot heard round the world," but also by the 
character of its people, — by such citizens as the patriotic Chap- 
lain Emerson ; by good old Dr. Ripley, who ruled so long as 
Parson and Autocrat, one of the rearguard of the army of the 
Puritans ; by Emerson and his brothers, and by Mrs. Samuel 
Ripley, the most learned, brilliant, and modest woman of 
" Our First Century," who made it classic ground ; and, last 
not least, by his own father, the Hon. Samuel Hoar, a modest, 
dignified, frugal, generous, wise man, whose word was law ; — 
born and bred in this happy town, which " stints its expense 
in small matters, that it may spend freely on great duties," 
and so inculcates frugality and public spirit; listening year by 
year to the story of the 19th April, or better still to the 
reminiscences of the survivors of the fight, — no wonder that he 
imbibed the belief that Concord, not Boston, was the hub of 
the universe, and that what was not done in Concord was not 
worth doing. 

His faith in his town, his State, his church, his College, his 
class, his political party, was absolute ; so profound were his 
convictions, so strong his attachments, that he seemed to mis- 
trust the sanity or sincerity of those who questioned their 
superiority. 

This claim, and his denunciations, private and public, of all 
dissenters, were calculated to affront those who were without 
the pale ; the assumption was naturall}' offensive to those of 
other nativities, or to those who had conscientiously arrived 
at other conclusions on matters, religious, social, or political, 
and was taken too literally by those who were devoid of a 
sense of humor, or not well acquainted with his complexities. 
For while it was difficult to trace the boundary line between 



32 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

his settled convictions and his cherislied illusions, to distin- 
guish between the sallies of his wit and the utterances of his 
righteous indignation, those who had known him best allowed 
for the mixture. 

They smiled at his local claims ; they respected his rugged 
simplicity ; they allowed for his excess, or what they deemed 
his perversion, of loyalty to his political party, for a certain 
astigmatism in looking at his associates and his opponents ; 
they pardoned asperities of which he seemed unconscious, 
remembering the many tokens he had given of his deep under- 
lying affection. I can give a specimen of this deep undercur- 
rent, of this amiable inconsistency. 

Writing to me, whose political debasement he had often 
deplored, about two common friends and kinsmen equally 
debased, he says, — 

" What I knew of G. leads me to think he deserved the eulogy 
you give. But I was very fond of W., who always was a trump ; 
and sickness and deprivation made him a hero, and as near a saint as 
it is good for anybody to be. 

" What a curious study it is to look back upon these finished lives, 
of men whom we have known from youth to old age, and how hard it 
is to believe that there can ever be any more like them ! " 

Again, in another letter, — 

" I never expect to find anybody in this world who is always right ; 
indeed (with the possible exception of one whom modesty forbids me 
to mention), I have never yet found one. 

" And as I grow old, I am more and more disposed to content 
myself with the admirable qualities of my numerous and excellent 
friends, and am caring less for their short-comings." 

This was his creed : nobody had ever been so blessed in his 
home, his friends, his surroundings ; they were incomparable, 
and his heart beat with gratitude and love. If he had ever 
said anything at variance with this sentiment, why, like his 
neighbor, Mr. Emerson, he refused to be hampered by 
consistency. 

Like other descendants of Roger Sherman, his wit flashed 
as brilliantly and continuously as heat lightning on a summer's 
evening ; he said as many good things as Abraham Lincoln, 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 33 

and he shared his tenderness as well as his humor, so that the 
victims of his satire, the subjects of his condemnation, felt that 
while he condemned the sin, he loved the sinner. 

Following in the footsteps of his Roman father, he, seconded 
by his devoted wife, became the guide and benefactor of his 
historic birthplace ; his Spartan simplicity, his sage counsels, 
his witty reproofs, and watchful benevolence will long be 
cherished by his bereaved townsfolk. 

He was the guardian, the benefactor of his class ; his loyalty 
and bounty to them were unstinted ; he was the keystone 
which locked them all together. 

Next to or abreast with his love of Concord, was his love of 
his Alma Mater, manifested by his unvarying attendance at 
her festivities, by his thirty years' service as Fellow or Over- 
seer, by donations on many occasions. 

While Treasurer of the Fund for Memorial Hall, I was struck 
with how he sought to express his love to the College as well 
as his homage to her noble sons, by bringing, first his own 
subscription, then one for a son, by and by for another son ; 
and lately his gift to Radcliffe College in the name of his 
ancestor, Joanna Hoar, and his legacy to the College proper, 
are further manifestations of the same yearning. 

I rejoice that some of the alumni, touched by his affection 
for the College and its children, testified their appreciation 
years ago by requesting a portrait to be hung in some Harvard 
Hall as a token to future generations. 

Writing to him in November last, besides other things I 

said, " As I near the precipice, I am getting scared " ; to which 

he replied, — 

" Fear ends with death ; bej-ond 
I nothing see but God," 

and added these lines of Parnell's, — 

" Stretch the glad wing, and soar away 
To mingle with eternal day ! " 

and with this feeling in his heart, if not on his lips, he wel- 
comed death. 

I cannot better sum up his excellences than by requoting 
what I said in his lifetime, — 

" If one wants to see Puritan principles carried into practice, let him 
visit Concord and witness the noble frugality and quiet dignity of that 

5 



34 TllIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF 

small circle of highly endowed and highly educated men and women to 
which Judge Hoar belongs, and which is characterized by those virtues 
easy to admire, hard to practise." 

Mr. Edward L. Pierce spoke as follows : — 

It is not for me to repeat in this presence the testimony 
which has come from others having a longer or closer connec- 
tion than mine with Judge Hoar ; but I crave the privilege 
of sharing in this day's tribute to his ever-to-be-cherished 
memory. It is a long career which we contemplate, begun 
with promise, and continuing to the end without an incident 
which calls for apology or explanation. 

He developed in youth capacity for the highest places in 
his profession. He had absolute clearness of intellect, which, 
after a keen sense of justice, is the first quality of a jurist. 
There was never for a moment obscurity in his mental vision. 

He held political offices only briefly and at long intervals, 
and these were but episodes of his life. It is a public loss 
that his service of this kind was so limited. But for forty 
years politicians who were plotting to suppress moral ques- 
tions or to advance their own selfish schemes had to take 
him into account. They knew that there was in Concord 
a man with whom they would have to reckon, — one whose 
intelligence they could not blind, whose moral sense they 
could not tamper with. Once, when others slunk away in 
fear and trembling from an encounter with the most audacious 
demagogue of the age, he faced undaunted a storm of calumny 
and abuse, with a self-consecration of which there is hardly a 
sublimer instance in ancient or modern story. 

Mr. Webster said on a memorial occasion, " One may live 
as a conqueror or a king or a magistrate, but he must die as a 
man." With that sentiment in our hearts, we shall not often 
recall the well-earned honors of our departed associate, or the 
robes of office which he wore so worthily : but we shall keep 
fresh in mind, so long as memory shall serve us, the wit which 
sparkled in every word ; the conscience which governed every 
act ; the civic courage which never quailed before authority, 
or the civium ardor prava jubentium ; the affection for friends 
which, outlasting differences of opinion, was faithful unto 
death ; the devotion to liberty which glowed as a perj)etual 



EBENEZER R. HOAR. 35 

fire from youth to age ; the simplicity in habits and ways 
which became one whose daily walks and drives were on 
those roads once trod by the embattled farmers of Concord 
and Lexington ; and the patriotism pure from ambition and 
self-seeking, which, inherited from his ancestors, he has trans- 
mitted to his descendants. Standing as it were before his 
open grave, I may be permitted to pronounce, with lips less 
worthy than his, the words of benediction, hallowed by the 
ages, which came from him as he held the hand of the dead 
Sumner, not yet cold : " Well done, good and faithful servant, 
enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 

Mr. Clement Hugh Hill was appointed to write the 
memoir of Judge Hoar for publication in the Proceedings. 



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